So to recap, we lived in Seattle for nine years and Thom and I loved it. But the entire time we were there we questioned whether we should be moving closer to family, moving to a farm and where... where to end up. By fall of '08 we were disgruntled with our indecision. I was unhapy working long days out of the house and never getting to take care of Turi myself. Thom was disgruntle with the runaround he was receiving from the county when he had worked there for more than two years, yet never made a full employee that could count on a job. We were both unhappy with our condo even though we loved the neighborhood and location. And, we had never found answers to our original questions that we had been asking for years... how close to family and to farm or not to farm and where.
Ready for a change and just wanting something drastic to get us to answer our own questions we decided to uproot ourselves and Turi and move to Houston for a three-year house-sitting agreement with my parents while they are out of country.
Well, this past year has certainly been enlightening. I know we still don't have our questions answered, but we learned a lot about ourselves and a lot about what we want. We suffered many stresses and bad luck including unemployment for five months, the loss of our cat, very low income once Thom found a job, a miscarriage, the loss of our new car, and debilitating sickness for more than five months of the last year. We've also had many blessings in new friends, time with Turi, a month at the beach, and time with a lot of other family that would not have been possible had we remained working in Washington.With adjustments to new weather and a new culture here in Houston we have had a busy year in Houston.
This year I have learned that I have been leaving a lot of our decisions unanswered because of fear. I put so much stress on getting things just right that I am afraid that if I commit to being a farmer it won't be right for me but that I already committed, that if I never commit that it will be a dream left unfullfilled (that I already told everyone in the world about), and that it we try, and we like it but we make all the wrong decisions we will just be big fat stressed out failures. I decided to start small and practical and answer little questions that can lead up to the big question...
1. with a not so perfect backyard here, can I commit to and succeed at a vegetable garden. How much can I grow?
2. In a new culture that is not ideal (not a lot of environmentalist pagans around here) can I branch out and make lasting connections because I will need to be more able to socialize with fewer and fewer people where we live if we move away from the city.
3. can I commit to being happy with my life at the moment and try harder to enjoy every day for what it is and not just yearn for the perfect life that may exist out there someday (though it probably doesn't)
So that is where I am starting this year and I think that our next step once we pull up our heals here is to trade our labor for food and shelter on an organic farm somewhere so we can try the life that someone else built first hand. We did this some while studying in Costa Rica, but we would like to concentrate on the farming aspect more and less on the forest studies.
After that, I'm sure that we will have built up many new thoughts and opinions and answers and of course, many new questions. I can not answer the questions my family and friends have been asking for years - Where are we going to end up? But, so far, I think even with all the hardship this past year, Houston was the right move for us. We needed to shake up our lives in order to reevaluate.
We move into this new year with hope. We are through with the move. We have a new bundle of baby on the way. Thom is really enjoying riding to work rather than driving. We have adjusted to our new income level. And we are starting to get answers about the things that have made me so sick over the past year.
Hope everyone out there is enjoying theirr life each day!
